1985 Porsche 944

[broady]

Weve come a long long way together, can I remember where we were? This lot came back from powder coating.



I bought a zinc plating kit, as I couldnt bring myself to put it back together with rusty hardware. And the cost of new was eye watering.

This was most of the front suspension hardware.



And this is what it transformed into. Its a time consuming process, but once you have a little production line set up its very easy.





I then set about the build.





I gave the steering rack a good going over and plated the hardware.



That went on with a freshy painted steering UJ.



With that all back on, I decided to spend some time in the engine bay. You may remember some time back that I had oil pressure reading issues. While cleaning and routing the loom, I found this broken and exposed oil pressure sender wire. I assume it was touching to earth as the engine rocked. Which would explaing why the gauge played up when I put my foot down.



With that in mind I set about many loom repairs and I looked up all the proper clips to make sure the loom would sit where it was supposed too. The omega clips are fairly cheap, so ive bought whats needed.

[broady]

Soooory, Ive been away again. 3 weeks with work on the Veteran Car Club GB's annual tour. The experience of a life time and I'm happy to tell you more and share photos if you want it. But for now, lets look at the proka. Obviously the job stopped for about a month. But Lots had happened before then.

Lets have a look at some nice details then. The door furniture was looking a tad grumpy against the new paint. So I set to.













Right some real work then, the fusty old wiper motor and mechanism. It was far to prominent to be left.



As you can see on the left, its had a repair in the past. And while they have never given me any issue. I wanted to fit an unrepaired item. I bought a second hand assembly from ebay, and made good from the two. In the bluest of peter style. Heres one I made earlier. Various bits painted and plated. Spindles polished and lubed, new o rings fitted.





Tangent, I spent many hours researching the factory colour for the brake calipers. Mine were red when I bought the car, and ive seen many others that were red. These were a bit show and no go for me. I painted them sivler some years ago. But it was looking tatty. In one of my many books I found photos of orginal calipers on a car. It seems they were the "gold" of Cadmium plating. Armed with this I got the paint out.

Well first I spent a bloody age cleaning, blasting and preping.







I plated all the hardware





The alternator needed brushing up, and up it brushed.



And another nicely plated bit. The adjustment rod.



Updates will be a little more regular now as theres less travel and life being a whirlwind for the next few months.

[75swb]

Jun 24, 2022 21:00:06 GMT broady said:

Soooory, Ive been away again. 3 weeks with work on the Veteran Car Club GB's annual tour. The experience of a life time and I'm happy to tell you more and share photos if you want it.

Well that sounds like a story that needs to be told!
Nice to see progress back on this again too. The plated hardware and fresh paint look spectacular

[jjeffries]

VERY nice work. I’m reassembling my 87 924S right now after having the engine out to chase a compression problem … a wild goose chase partly of my own making, it turned out. American 944’s likely all had A/C but yours without it leaves nice room in that front right corner of the engine bay. Impressive work on you plating, too. Anyway, I’ve covered pretty much all the same territory as you. Mine’s Guards Red … but I prefer you G.P. White.

John

[broady]

Jun 24, 2022 21:45:46 GMT 75swb said:

Jun 24, 2022 21:00:06 GMT broady said:

Soooory, Ive been away again. 3 weeks with work on the Veteran Car Club GB's annual tour. The experience of a life time and I'm happy to tell you more and share photos if you want it.

Well that sounds like a story that needs to be told!
Nice to see progress back on this again too. The plated hardware and fresh paint look spectacular

Then its a story I will tell in the coming weeks. Thanks very much, hopefully it wont be much longer before people can see it without the use of a screen!

Jun 25, 2022 3:14:53 GMT jjeffries said:

VERY nice work. I’m reassembling my 87 924S right now after having the engine out to chase a compression problem … a wild goose chase partly of my own making, it turned out. American 944’s likely all had A/C but yours without it leaves nice room in that front right corner of the engine bay. Impressive work on you plating, too. Anyway, I’ve covered pretty much all the same territory as you. Mine’s Guards Red … but I prefer you G.P. White.

John

Thanks very much, I did have a read of your thread earlier this year. Lots of useful info thats helped me when Ive not been sure of how something should be assembled.

[broady]

I told you it was going to be a bit more regular. Were somewhere in April, and I want to get some horrible jobs out the way. The HVAC is a right fiddle on these, and I also though id replace the heater matric while I was in there. The old one looks passed its best and its peanuts for a new one.

I had also never had much luck with the directional flaps, they never quite seemed to do what the levers were indicating. The other thing which was blindingly obvious was, nearly 40 year old foam, isnt foam any more. So all the seurfaces needed cleaning off and fresh foam applying.

Once I actually looked at the unit, I found one flap was wedged with a piece of wood glued in, and the cable wasnt connected to anything becuse the lever had snapped off. This box is such a B@*&^% to remove, that if youve got it out, why not just replace the broken bit? They are about £40 today, so must have been given away for free over 10 years ago!

So I spent my £40 and ordered a complete second hand box, I elected to go black rather than white, so it harder to see under the dash. I then made a good one from the two.



I had to pop all these little clips off to split the box in half and get the flaps out.





I forgot to take photos as usual having got stuck into the job. The real fiddle was having to depin this plug, in order to feed the wires through the body for the blower motor.



I installed the motor any applied new foam seals to the top of the box.



Upon trying to install the box, this foam has proven too thin. Unfortunately by this stage, I have connected up the heater cable and this is such a curse word to do I'm going to try and apply some more foam insitu. Wish me luck.

Reasonable lump to take care of new, the box o'cogs was leaky and gotty. If you got back to page 1 you will see it before it was gunked and jet washed many times.



Many hours with verious mechanical corrsosion removal tools



Once it was clean as a clean things thats just had a shower. I etched and then painted silver.



And then the same on the steel section, but black.



I installed new flange seals, shift seal, diff cover seal. You get the idea, all new seals.

I then set about the gold bits.





All the linkage wearing parts and seals were replaced. So this should sharpen up what was already a fair tight gear change.

Next time, another fiddly job, running brake pipes.

[pptom]

Outstanding work in this whole thread, that's one lucky car.

[broady]

Jun 26, 2022 20:57:19 GMT pptom said:

Outstanding work in this whole thread, that's one lucky car.

Thank you very much, I feel like I'm skipping so many bits. But they are at least things I can revisit in the winter if they stil annoy me.

[broady]

Right then you ugly lot. Lets see a bit more.

A friend came around and the missus came out to help. The bonnet was laid on some padding in the garden, we cleaned it up and installed some sound proofing. The genuine part. very tricky as this was extremely sticky and a very much one and done kinda job.



Very happy with the results, it took use about and hour. But its tranformed the underbonnet.

A few under bonnet fixtures and fittings. Plated the clutch reserviour calmp and washed out the res, a new house with plated fittings and a cleaned up master cylinder.







Stripped both of these down, derusted and freshly painted, I saved the ATE decal as well.





We will come back to that. Between coats of paint I started making new brake pipes. Not easy to take photos of the manufacture and a lot of it was just guess work/by eye.







While I was under there, I did a bit of work on the fuel pipes and routing. Pump and filter.







Next up it was time to fit the gearbox, a bit of a clever wiggling to get it in. I was annoyed to find out that the coupler didnt line up. Which explains why it was bodged before and I hadnt realised why.

As you can see the splines were still showing. This wouldnt let me get the second clamping bolt in.



I should look like this.



After a bit of gentle persuation managed to move the shaft a few mm along the torque tube.



I then did a dry build on my lawn to make sure it all lines up. And it did.



I then had a messy few hours cleaning up CV joints, they were built up with fresh grease and new boots. Once they were done, torque tube in, back axle in and then gearbox. With that back in, I put the driveshafts in. This in reality took a me more than half a day, but it was a job well jobbed.



Cheapo new tool day. CV boot clip too.

[jim]

you've done an amazing job of the 944

[bstardchild]

Lovely work - thanks for sharing the progress so far

[rm36house]

Looking very good. Can you tell me more about your plating setup?

[jjeffries]

If you haven’t put it back in the car yet, replacing the bearings in the torque housing isn’t THAT bad of a job.

John

[broady]

Jul 6, 2022 20:00:35 GMT bstardchild said:

Lovely work - thanks for sharing the progress so far

Glad youre enjoying it! Its nice to know people are reading it.

Jul 7, 2022 7:01:42 GMT rm36house said:

Looking very good. Can you tell me more about your plating setup?

A nice simple set up from www.gaterosplating.co.uk/shop

They are local to me, which meant he was able to run me through the full process with all the varriable and different finishing solutions.
Its time consuming rather than complicated. But prep is key. Always make sure everything is clean, so spend ages degreasing if required, a dip in brick cleaner removes any old plating, then I media blast. Depending on the part I may polish it up a bit and then degrease it again.

Then I have 4 further tubs, first is an alkaline cleaner, they sit in there for 15 mins, then washed in tap water, into an etch tub, it will fizz after a few seconds and then wash again. The parts are then hung from copper wires into the plating solution. Around the edge of the tank is the zinc. When the current is applied (I have a small varriable current controller), zinc is drawn towards your items hanging on the copper wires. Its the reverse of electrolysis really.

Once the parts a suffiently plated, usally 20 to 30 minutes. They come out and you guessed it, they're washed again. Then the final step is option, but it adds a futher layer of protection. Passivation, many colours are available, clear, blue, black yellow/gold ect. I swish it round in this tub for 10 or 20 seconds and then wash and dry. Usually outside on a warm day.

Now I have the kit and know how it works, I will create a proper set up thats self contained, rather than letting it take over my work bench. But that a job for another day.

Jul 7, 2022 17:19:49 GMT jjeffries said:

If you haven’t put it back in the car yet, replacing the bearings in the torque housing isn’t THAT bad of a job.

John

That went back in a few weeks ago. Its what the gearbox is bolted to in one of the last photos. Luckily my bearings are all nice and smooth, with no jingly sounds at idle. Long may it continue!

[broady]

At this point I was completely fed up of laying under the car. Having been on the drving tour for 3 weeks id lost all my muscles I usually had for getting up and down/ shimmining ect. So my legs now ached like curse word. Time for some work at my height. The pop up head light assembly is a complicated little curse word, so I got on with building these on the bench. Popping speed nuts on the frame.





You may note the complicated spring arrangment on the left hand side. This one wasnt too bad, but the drivers side. The torque from the spring kept forcing the fork to pop of the end. It took some vice grip figners to keep it all held together before I could get it on the pivot pins mounted in the car.



Black plastics all tooth brush clean and coated with a "reblackener"



Heres one I made earlier. Prior to this I also sorted out the headlight washer system, more new parts from Porsche. Proper mounting guides and spaces on the back side, unlike the total curse word I removed. Ive even fitted new gaskets under the nozzles, because I hate owning money!

Back to the lights, both assemblies in the car.



Next up an afternoons work went into main beam and inicator installation. As with everything, first job was to get the tooth brush out and clean everything until id be prepared to lick it. Then dig out the correct hardware to fasten it all together.



I only did the above job as away of avoiding installing the headlight lifting mechanism. But in the end I had to pucker up and do it.



Everything is either coated in cadmium effect paint or is acutally zinc palted. This was quite an involved job, cleaning all the pivot bearings and aligning things, there was a full days work to get this to a state where I was happy with it.

A previous mong had painted the bumper pads body colour some years ago. These are supposed to be black and textured. I paint stripped them and unfortunately they were no longer textured. As they were "knackered" I decided to have a bash with the crinkly paint I had left over from the cambox. Worst case was Id be buying two new ones, which is where I was at already. Pleasingly they came out perfect!



On they went with a set of eye lids and thats the front end, looking much more front endy.

[broady]

Sticking with the front end, Theres a lot of clobber up there to squeeze in. Easier to get the radiator in now. I'm running the later S2 radiator. Its slightly better at cooling and seems more duarable than my orginal, which cracked and leaked some years ago. As with everything, it got a looking at, a clean and corrective action. First just was to clean the veins out.



I sat with some tweezers and picked out every bit of curse word. It was obviously hungry.



The bottom face is ally, and was showing a bit of surface fur, so it was given a clean up, a coat of chromate and then from silver top coat. They were silly expensive, so hopefully itll last a few more years yet.

In it was bolted. With a new seal along the top edge, as predicatably the old foam had turned to dust many years ago.



This intake scoop had a deal of over spray on it from a previous muppet, so I covered it in paint stripper and it perked up. I will likely buy a new item if its available at a later date.



It took a couple of coats.



I continued to fettle and prep odds and sods ready for the front bumper to go on.

And another visit to OPC hull for more parts I didnt know I needed. But the prices are so reasonable and I get to drool at the new stuff while I'm there, I don't mind overly much.



A small order of a few cable clips and ties.









Those of you with a keen eye, will have noticed that a brake pipe wasnt made or connected there. I forget why exactly. I think I was a lack of pipe clips. Anyway heres some satisfying flaring.



And all the bending to make this one.



Distraction time, a friend of mine, Moler made him self available one saturday afternoon. He owns the skills that I did not. The graphic on the rear of the car needed applying. I bought a brand new decal from wooliesworkshop quite some time ago. More than a year I seem to recall. It was advertised as 924/944. After quite a bit of time spent measuring at marking , something wasnt quite right. We hit google to look at 944 rear end photos and see what seemed like original cars. The first thing was noticed was the font was completely different.



Further googling showed that the decal I recieved was actually 924. And that 924 and 944 were not the same, so ive no idea why they were selling them as the same thing. I'm glad we spotted it before it was applied, otherwise id have been very angry.

Luckily in the loft I had an old, very old original sticker. It was missing one of the end flicks. Comparing the two, the end flicks from the new decal could be used. So the master set to work again.



After many many "times" we got things alighned as we wanted them. The end result.



Another little distraction, the roof trims needed new seals fitted. I figured best done on a hot day.







Lots more small jobs on the go.



And I don't know why, but a photo from the underside.



That photo is about 3 weeks ago, I have had a real push on since then. I was determined to get the car drivable by the end of July. Mainly because I'm so fed up of spending my life in the garage. I can then revisit parts which need titivation at a later date. Id rather be driving then cleaning at this time of year! So July 31st, here I come. Its been one hell of a 3 weeks. But will I manage it?

[oioisavaloy]

Incredible attention to detail and execution. Absolutely love it. Keep up the good work and that first drive, after all your hard work, is going to be amazing. Love the zinc plating you're doing.

Are some of the clips you're buying (for lines and things) 3d printed or OE? They're the sorts of things that you could do yourself....(if you've got the time, and er, a 3d printer!!).

[broady]

Jul 25, 2022 7:28:22 GMT oioisavaloy said:

Incredible attention to detail and execution. Absolutely love it. Keep up the good work and that first drive, after all your hard work, is going to be amazing. Love the zinc plating you're doing.

Are some of the clips you're buying (for lines and things) 3d printed or OE? They're the sorts of things that you could do yourself....(if you've got the time, and er, a 3d printer!!).

Thank you very much, the drive doesn't feel far away now! The zinc plating will return in the winter. I've got a few bits I've skipped that need some attention.

All of the clips are direct from porschr, they cost peanuts. But you raise an interesting point, late last year I was given a starter 3d printer (as you may have seen earlier in the thrwad with the intake blanks I printed). So I've quickly learned the software and I designed and made some clips, using old ones as patterns. I can post some photos up later.

I was just getting the hang of it, and bought a roll of suitable material the printer expired. I tried a couple of fixes. But none worked, so I kicked it to one side and went ahead with the car. Given I could buy all the clips, it was logical to just buy them and return to the printer when the car is done.

I already have 2 other projects lined up after the 944. So don't worry!

[broady]

A quick look at a little printing project then. Brake pad wear sensor cable clips. A couple of mine were old and brittle, when I remove the cable a tang snapped off. I drew one up on cad,



I then set it to print, but with out the mounting clips, as I couldnt figure out how to print a shape that didnt have 1 flat face to base it on.

This was in draft mode, and it came out as required.



I then learned about tree supports from Jim, who helped me with a lot of the basics of 3d printing. I then printed another draft, but with the clips.



At this point I bought some black PETG fillament, as more suitable material for these clips. Set the printer up and turned it on. I then crapped itself as the bed heater refused to work. Ive replace a couple of bits and done a few common fault checks based on googling. Nothing fixed it and building a 944 was more important!

[broady]

A bit further down the path then. HVAC going in. A brand new heat exchanger was fitted as well. Luckily these are Mahle and cheap enough, they're the same as a Mk1 golf and I assume many other things from the VAG bin. It was a curse word to line up the two water pipes and then get the cap on with its air seal. This helped with a touch of cable routing as well, though you can see the hell that awaits on the left there. Just before CAN bus, this car has miles of cable! And it feels like every single one of them finds their way to one or both of the fuse boxes. Yes it has 2.



So with the heat matrix plumbed in the cooling system was complete and I was able to fit it a bleed it. And you know what that means, test run of the engine! Its only got the header on, but it sounded well enough to me. I had the gauges plugged in to check the pressure and temp, both read well.



A big relief and a box ticked. It ran so I had no backward steps to complete in order to make it run! I had filled the cooling system with tap water for a leak check. Once it had run and proved it didnt wet its self. I upgraded to distilled water to help prevent corrosion and mineral build up.



Further armed with the running knowledge, I bleed the brakes. As eventhing was stripped and cleaned, I filled up with DOT 5, silicone based rather than the more conventional mineral based as DOT 5 isnt hydroscopic and can handle almost the same temperatures as DOT 5.1.

To make one of my least favourite jobs, a little less painful. I used one of my failed old pressure bleeders, but connected the air supply to my compressor via a PCL fitting. I turn the regulator down to 10psi. I filled the res up, connected the bleed tool and applied air pressure. I was then a very easy 10 minutes, wandering around all 4 corners and open the nipples. I did this, depressureised, topped up the res and repeated. No mess, no fuss. So happy was I, I bleed the clutch while I was at it too.

Next up it was time to stick the exhaust on. Ive long since had Dansk mid and rear sections fitted. A small issue with this is, they're 3in diameter for later cars. It was always a job to get it to seal, even after using a tube expander to try and get mine close to 3in. My exhaust is 2.5in. I bought a step up section from a famous online aution site. This isnt my sexiest welding or best gas flow work. But this part of my exhaust will need to be replaced it not may years anyway, there just wasnt the budget at the moment.



With that painted, the following day jim of Mk1 cortina fame came over and helped me get the exhaust cleaned up and isntalled. Along with my newly aquired heat sheilds. These have been missing as long as owned the car, so we had a fun guessing game figuring out how and where these went.





Jim got his elbow grease out and polished up the silencers while I was titting about with something else. I forget what.

Heres the man popping some screws into the rear heat shield.



We assmbled both silencers together on the floor and then assembled the full unit onto the car in one hit.





He spent a bit of time cleaning up my rear light clusters, again I was buggering about doing something else.



Having consumed some bacon and coffee, we felt happy with our achivements for the day. Oh and we gave tinas clutch a bleed with my new toy too.

Once Jim was on his way home, I spent a bit of time working on the rear light install. This required some butil tape. Working with this is like covering the item in glue, covering your hands in glue, and then trying to handle a strip of glue and get it to stick to the thing you want it too without covering everything else you own in glue.



Given the above, I ended up with this.



Some minutes later.



I then repeated the agrument on the otherside and got the lights working.



By this point id come to realised that I wasnt actually very far from being able to drive this car. It was July 16th and I decided come hell or high water. Putin or brexit, I was driving this car before the end of the month. But in true teaser serial style, would I manage it, just over 2 weeks to achive! Tune in next time resto fans.